What does it take to make a grown man cry? For this battle-hardened reporter, all it takes is a trip to the movies to see the latest kid cartoon.
Think I’m kidding?
With two small girls still in tow, I’ve seen most of what comes out of shops like Disney and Pixar these days.
That makes me something of an expert on kid flicks, but where they are experts is in the art of manipulating emotion.
Who could forget when Simba’s dad dies in The Lion King at the hands of the wicked Uncle Scar?
Or when girlfriend Nala wonders aloud about the lost potential in Simba when she sings,
“Why can’t he see what I see? The king I see inside.”
Excuse me a second, kids, Dad has something in his eye.
Then there’s Ice Age when the Woolly Mammoth sees cave drawings of how humans killed his parents.
The camera zooms in as the eyes grow larger and fill with tears.
I have to visit the restroom, kids. Be right back.
There’s the look on Nemo’s face when he hears that his never-leave-the-corral-reef father traveled across an ocean battling sharks and gulf streams just to find him.
There’s the look of awe on the faces of the Incredible children when they see their parents fight as superheroes for the first time, an image far removed from the middle class dweebs the kids believe their parents to be.
Excuse me, I have to pick something up off the floor here for a minute, wait, I mean tie my shoes, yea, that’s it.
Advances in computer graphics have turned animated features into real works of art these days. But the real artistry, like any other movie, is in connecting to the human element.
Check one out when you get the chance. But don’t forget the hanky.